4 ms·

Some of the themes remind me of themes mentioned in this matrix analysis. Specifically I am reminded of the Dune concept of control: "you control what you can

Some of the themes remind me of themes mentioned in this matrix analysis. Specifically I am reminded of the Dune concept of control: "you control what you can destroy" and then asking "do you control your refrigerator?". Sure, you can turn it off but then your food would rot and you might starve. So in a real sense humans have not controlled machines for a long time but have been co evolving in symbiosis. Sure, it's not driven by natural selection and standard rules of life, but it is important to frame our relationship with machines in new ways if we're ever going to make some sort of artificial intelligence. https://youtube.com/watch?v=BETHWKaXX4k https://youtube.com/watch?v=BETHWKaXX4k

andai 5mo ago
Could you elaborate on that last part?
- willis936 5mo ago
  I didn't mean it as in changing our framing enables technological progress but something we should do if we don't want to lose the control we have. e.g. if we lose all principle and intention then it doesn't really matter what happens with computers. In order to do something with intention we must first understand what we're doing. Skipping that step is an admission of defeat.
yetihehe 5mo ago
I can destroy my refrigerator pretty easily. If I care about food inside, I can take it out into a new one. So, seems I control it by that definition. Your idea "but food will spoil"/"I will lose a small amount of wealth" seems irrelevant to the strict definition. Conversely I think it's a bad definition, it's a show of what is the frame of the mind of the person who states that: "I want to show my control by destroying my things, look how powerful I am" which sounds like a toddler. That's how you portray psychopathic/narcissistic disorders in movies.
- willis936 5mo ago
  The fridge is a toy example. Take all machinery man has made and destroy it. Will you survive? Or live in a space ship and destroy the ship. Will you survive? Or have a pacemaker or an iron lung or dialysis. How about the simple concept of a combustion engine or any necessary subcomponent, where removing that today would grind all logistics to a halt. How long do you survive? Just because you have one machine that is replaceable doesn't refute that you need machines as much as they need you. If you so readily dismiss Herbert's definition of control posit a competitor and we can pressure test it. Also, "correlated with a toddler's world view" is not the epic rhetorical refute you think it is.
  - vhkhkyg 5mo ago
    [flagged]
    - willis936 5mo ago
      You quoted me saying that humans and machines need each other the same amount and in the same breath said that I said that humans need machines more. You really shouldn't be doing this kind of thing when making the case that someone else is stupid.
- andrewflnr 5mo ago
  > sounds like a toddler. I think you missed the point. It's absolutely nothing to do with what's good to do, only brute facts of power. What things can or can't you cause to happen? And indeed, toddlers and psychopaths have a scarily good understanding of what power is.
  - yetihehe 5mo ago
    I didn't miss the point. I showed other more usable (in my opinion) point of views. I think that definition is so narrow that it starts being absurd. > It's absolutely nothing to do with what's good to do, only brute facts of power. This sentence reads like: "if we narrow our view this much, this makes sense". I agree that it makes sense under the condition that we narrow the view of issue. It's valid in this small context (a film about controlling one thing). > And indeed, toddlers and psychopaths have a scarily good understanding of what power is. I disagree completely with this sentence. They are good at controlling in certain situations. They don't understand it. If you want to understand it, there is a lot of information about controlling, whole fields of knowledge that people spend many years on studying. As for psychopaths, they are very predictable and controllable when you understand control theory and how psychopaths operate. There are courses on this single topic by people who need to do it to prevent tragedies (police negotiators) and they are not that complicated.
slopinthebag 5mo ago
> Sure, you can turn it off but then your food would rot and you might starve. If I live in a world where I can afford a freezer with food in it, it's practically guaranteed I can destroy my fridge without starving to death after. Heck, even if I was completely broke I could destroy my fridge and would have a pretty good (+99.999%) chance of not dying in the next year from starvation. I get I'm nitpicking your point a bit, but I actually think most of our machines we could destroy and still be fine. We'd need to make sacrifices to our quality of life of course..
quirkot 4mo ago
Gotta keep in mind that "you control what you can destroy" was expressed as the crux of a single-planet guerrilla group's maximalist negotiation strategy with an interstellar government, where the destruction was of the ability to travel between the stars. It's not a coherent theory of control outside of the razor thin application of "I'm willing to accept pain as long it hurts you much more." It is not a control that builds stability and infrastructure, it is the control of base extortion

andai 5mo ago

Could you elaborate on that last part?

willis936 5mo ago
I didn't mean it as in changing our framing enables technological progress but something we should do if we don't want to lose the control we have. e.g. if we lose all principle and intention then it doesn't really matter what happens with computers. In order to do something with intention we must first understand what we're doing. Skipping that step is an admission of defeat.

yetihehe 5mo ago

I can destroy my refrigerator pretty easily. If I care about food inside, I can take it out into a new one. So, seems I control it by that definition. Your idea "but food will spoil"/"I will lose a small amount of wealth" seems irrelevant to the strict definition. Conversely I think it's a bad definition, it's a show of what is the frame of the mind of the person who states that: "I want to show my control by destroying my things, look how powerful I am" which sounds like a toddler. That's how you portray psychopathic/narcissistic disorders in movies.

willis936 5mo ago
The fridge is a toy example. Take all machinery man has made and destroy it. Will you survive? Or live in a space ship and destroy the ship. Will you survive? Or have a pacemaker or an iron lung or dialysis. How about the simple concept of a combustion engine or any necessary subcomponent, where removing that today would grind all logistics to a halt. How long do you survive? Just because you have one machine that is replaceable doesn't refute that you need machines as much as they need you. If you so readily dismiss Herbert's definition of control posit a competitor and we can pressure test it. Also, "correlated with a toddler's world view" is not the epic rhetorical refute you think it is.
- vhkhkyg 5mo ago
  [flagged]
  - willis936 5mo ago
    You quoted me saying that humans and machines need each other the same amount and in the same breath said that I said that humans need machines more. You really shouldn't be doing this kind of thing when making the case that someone else is stupid.
andrewflnr 5mo ago
> sounds like a toddler. I think you missed the point. It's absolutely nothing to do with what's good to do, only brute facts of power. What things can or can't you cause to happen? And indeed, toddlers and psychopaths have a scarily good understanding of what power is.
- yetihehe 5mo ago
  I didn't miss the point. I showed other more usable (in my opinion) point of views. I think that definition is so narrow that it starts being absurd. > It's absolutely nothing to do with what's good to do, only brute facts of power. This sentence reads like: "if we narrow our view this much, this makes sense". I agree that it makes sense under the condition that we narrow the view of issue. It's valid in this small context (a film about controlling one thing). > And indeed, toddlers and psychopaths have a scarily good understanding of what power is. I disagree completely with this sentence. They are good at controlling in certain situations. They don't understand it. If you want to understand it, there is a lot of information about controlling, whole fields of knowledge that people spend many years on studying. As for psychopaths, they are very predictable and controllable when you understand control theory and how psychopaths operate. There are courses on this single topic by people who need to do it to prevent tragedies (police negotiators) and they are not that complicated.

slopinthebag 5mo ago

> Sure, you can turn it off but then your food would rot and you might starve. If I live in a world where I can afford a freezer with food in it, it's practically guaranteed I can destroy my fridge without starving to death after. Heck, even if I was completely broke I could destroy my fridge and would have a pretty good (+99.999%) chance of not dying in the next year from starvation. I get I'm nitpicking your point a bit, but I actually think most of our machines we could destroy and still be fine. We'd need to make sacrifices to our quality of life of course..

quirkot 4mo ago

Gotta keep in mind that "you control what you can destroy" was expressed as the crux of a single-planet guerrilla group's maximalist negotiation strategy with an interstellar government, where the destruction was of the ability to travel between the stars. It's not a coherent theory of control outside of the razor thin application of "I'm willing to accept pain as long it hurts you much more." It is not a control that builds stability and infrastructure, it is the control of base extortion